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The Benefits of Direct Mail For Contractors in 2015

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direct mail for contractors

We are about to start doing NFL-themed magnetic postcard mailers now that the team schedules have hit the street, and while working on what many (including myself) would consider “old-school” marketing, I started thinking about how great direct mail actually is…especially in 2015.

Here’s why…

Since the advent of the internet, we’ve seen endless benefits when it comes to how contractors can enhance their marketing and grow their customer base. The fact that with just one click of a button we are able to send out a mass e-mail to everyone in our contact list is truly remarkable.More

Winning The Long Game With Postcards

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In my weekly newsletter yesterday, I talked about postcards and how you can take a 3-second ad and turn it into a year-long billboard placed right inside your prospects kitchen with one simple step. Watch the video to see how you can too. If you want to get the details on from yesterday’s newsletter, sorry, you gotta sign up! 🙂 But you can sign up by clicking here, then entering your email address in the sidebar.

7 Tips to Building Better Direct Mail for Contractors

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Direct mail is a $40 billion dollar industry that can trace its roots back to the good old Sears catalog, where you could buy anything from mules to tractors to strawberries and ice. We’ve come a long way since those days, but unfortunately most of the direct mail pieces you get today haven’t, which is one of the reasons conversion ratios are stuck in the .05%-2% range.

But you can make sure your next campaign brings home the bacon simply by building a better direct mail piece from the top down. So let’s get started at the top and talk about headlines first.

1. The headline – This is the billboard of the piece. This is what convinces the reader that the rest of the ad is worth reading so make sure to grab them with a compelling statement in your headline.

2. Art/Pictures/Graphics – Try to stay away from stock clip art, it’s pretty obvious. Besides, you should have plenty of photos to use from your completed jobs. Use positive images that are eye-catching for your target.

3. Layout – The layout should look like a mini billboard. Keep it clean and uncluttered with a text-to-whitespace ratio as close to 50% as possible. This will make it easy on the eyes of your reader and easier for them to absorb your primary message.

4. Onto the message – Keep this short and sweet. Make your benefits to the reader the focal point while making sure to be as clear and concise as possible. You should also play to your reader’s emotions since this brings in a higher response rate.More

Go Big or Go Home!

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Post cards are a great way to turn passively engaged consumers into buyers by providing them with an irresistible offer right? Of course!

But they need to read it first!

So make your next direct mail piece easier to get read by sending out an over-sized mailer. Instead of the usual 4×6 postcard that gets overlooked, why not shoot for a 6×8 or larger piece?

Sending larger direct mail cards allows you to:

Say more – if you don’t say it, people assume you don’t do it.

Stand out – increase your chances of gaining a new client or customer by being the biggest thing they take out of their mailbox that day.

Big mail gets read – In fact, the bigger the piece, the better your chances are that your mail gets read first.

You can mail cheaper – I normally recommend that contractors send DM pieces First Class mail for regular 4×6 sized cards. It is a confidence factor that speaks volumes about your organization when the prospect is deciding on what to do with your piece. But bigger direct mail cards can’t go out regular First Class, but you can still send them cheaper since the implied perception is that they cost more (and they do) because they are bigger. Which means the information is more valuable to the reader. Remember, it is all psychological. So, the next time you do a mail drop; make sure you go big to get a better responses!

Ad Design by Design

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Ad design and layout is equal parts art and science. The science is the math in knowing what converts and how well. The art comes from the creative. A strong call to action with a solid USP always wins. But how you position those components on the page – direct mail – flyer – even website matters just as much. So today I want to give you some ideas on what to include in your ad design as well as where to place it on the page.

Headline use

The last thing you want to do is put your company name in the headline. I know you love the name of your business, but your readers could care less. They want to know what’s in it for them. So use this space to target the buyer.

“We’ll solve your air conditioning problem in two hours or less…guaranteed!” is much more effective than “Bob’s Heating & Air Conditioning – Home of The Happy Heater!”

Key ingredients

Just like the cakes and pies our Moms used to make from scratch, there are key ingredients to creating ads from both a content standpoint as well as a design perspective. So, if your ads contain nothing else, make sure you have the following 5 key ingredients:

  1. Never talk about yourself, always target the buyer
  2. You have to have a USP, or hook, or whatever you want to call an attention grabber
  3. Focus on your copy and your graphics since graphics tell the story of your copy
  4. Obviously, your name, phone number and website are a must
  5. List your convenience and trust factors – “24 Hour Emergency Service” is a good example while listing any industry associations or memberships help with trust factor along with years in business, family run company or photos of principles.

Typeface and Fonts

Mix it up a bit by using 2 or 3 typefaces to showcase specific talking points from your ad copy, and never use all caps. While you are at it, avoid compartmentalizing the ad by placing lines that separate copy from pictures.

Design factors

You also need to make sure that your picture doesn’t interfere with your ad copy. So if you have one big picture underneath your text, make sure the ad copy is clear to the reader.

Use bullet points in rows to draw attention to services, features and benefits, and highlights you want to make sure the reader looks at. If nothing else, readers look at the headline and bullet points of ads.

When using a photo, show an image of the user gaining a benefit from your product or service. Emergency type services (plumbers/tree removal/roofers) love to show the pain side of advertising, but people are already feeling the pain, that is why they are looking at your ad (usually) so provide them with the “pleasure” effect with your image.

Make sure your photos face into the ad, not away from it.

And finally, be stingy with color, only highlighting the MAJOR points of the ad copy will draw the most attention to those points.

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